The rate and degree of human rights abuse in North Korea is alarming; more shocking is the fact that these violations are being carried out by the Government against its own people.

How can a Government commit such atrocities against its own people?
United Nations inquiry has just concluded that the range and scope of abuse of North Korea’s 25 million citizens is beyond what many imagined.
The regime is accused of committing crimes against humanity including the extermination, starvation and enslavement of its population.
The are about 80,000 to 120,000 people in torture camps which consists those trying to flee the country, Christians or others seen as promoting ‘subversive’ beliefs, anyone viewed as ‘anti-government’ and political prisoners. The situation of torture in these camps are horrific: execution, enslavement, starvation, rape and forced abortion. The UN report is remarkable for the fierceness of its condemnation. It describes a totalitarian state that is without parallel in the contemporary world and with resemblance to Nazi Germany. North Korea has flatly rejected the UN’s accusations, just as it continues to deny the existence of its network of prison camps which are among the deadliest in the world.

How the North Korean Government violates human rights of its citizens:

• The Government of North Korea divides its citizens into three castes based on their perceived loyalty to Supreme Leader:
“core” (haeksim kyechung), “wavering” (tongyo kyechung), and
“hostile” (joktae kyechung). Most of the wealth is concentrated among the “core,” while the “hostile”–a category that includes all members of minority faiths, as well as descendants of perceived enemies of the state–are denied employment and subject to starvation.

• The North Korean government enforces loyalty and obedience through its Ministry of People’s Security, which requires citizens
to spy on each another, including family members. Anyone who is overheard saying anything perceived as critical to the government is subject to torture, execution, or imprisonment in one of North Korea’s ten brutal concentration camps.

• All radio and television stations,
newspapers and magazines, and church sermons are government controlled and focus on praise of the “Dear Leader”. Anyone who makes contact with foreigners in any way, or listens to foreign radio stations (some of which are accessible in North Korea), is in danger of any of the penalties
described above. Traveling outside of North Korea is also forbidden, and can carry a penalty of death!.

• the North Korean government maintains ten concentration camps, with a total of between 200,000 and 250,000 prisoners contained therein. Conditions in the camps are terrible, and the annual casualty rate has been estimated as high as 25%. The North Korean government has no due process system, imprisoning, torturing, and executing prisoners at will. Public executions, in particular, are a common sight in North Korea.

• During the 1990s, as many as 3.5 million North Koreans died of starvation. Sanctions are not imposed on North Korea primarily
because they would block grain donations from the Government, resulting in the deaths of millions more, a possibility that does not appear to concern the Leader. Malnutrition is very common except among the ruling class; the average North Korean 7-year-old is eight inches shorter than the average South Korean child of the same age.

China aiding and abetting human crimes in North Korea?China maintains close ties with North Korea and some supplies by China is considered important to the survival of Kim Jong-Un’s Government.
Chinese leaders refused to let the UN commission of Inquiry visit its border provinces with North Korea (just as North Korea totally refused the commision’s visit) and have opposed the commission’s inquiry from the start. China received a critical letter from the commission, suggesting that they are ‘aiding and abetting crimes against humanity’ Refugees are routinely rounded up inside China and returned to North Korea, often to face imprisonment, torture and even execution.
Having gathered so much evidence of human rights abuse in North Korea, the UN is supposed to refer the case to the International Criminal Court (ICC) for prosecution. However, China might use its right of veto, as a permanent member of the UN Security Council, to block referral to the ICC.

It is extremely despicable that for decades now, there has been a systematic violation and gross abuse of human rights in North Korea, perpetrated by the Government. North Korea’s Government is easily the most oppressive regime in the world. There is almost no freedom of information and association, no freedom of speech, no democracy, no justice and a continuous violation of other human rights. North Korean people are not even permitted to leave their country!!!
The North Korean Government should stop all these extreme methods of ensuring loyalty to the Leader. There is definitely no excuse to trample on the fundamental human rights of their own citizens. The use of force and other savage mechanisms to ensure loyalty to the state only amounts to oppressing its own people; and has only succeeded in turning North Korea into “the home of human rights abuses”.